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One of the most mind-boggling things about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is its longevity. The comics have been around since the 1980s and the cartoons that a generation of kids grew up on soon followed. The movies came later, and over the course of the past few years, the Green Machine keeps being reinvented. It’s now onto a computer-animated series.

All of those children’s shows are decent, but they fail to capture the grittier essence of the old comic. Perhaps, that’s one of the reasons I’m drawn to Red Fly Studio’s take on the franchise. TMNT Out of the Shadows tries to be more Chris Nolan rather than Tim Burton with a realistic approach to the turtles.

At an eyes-only demo, the first thing I noticed was that the heroes looked different. Donatello was tall and lanky. Raphael was the burliest while Michelangelo stood stocky and short. Meanwhile, Leo was average out of all them. That was the intention, according to lead designer Chris Frechette. The developer was a fan who grew up with the toys and the cartoons. He calls the project “a dream come true.”

Can lightning strike twice? Capcom had a huge hit when it brought back its Street Fighter series and now the Japanese company is bringing back another fighting game from its arcade portfolio. Darkstalkers, arguably its second most popular franchise in the genre, is returning to consoles in early 2013. But it isn’t getting the Street Fighter IV treatment … yet. Capcom is bringing back the monster-filled series as a downloadable game called Darkstalkers Resurrection.

Available on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade, the game will feature Night Warriors: Darkstalkers Revenge and Darkstalkers 3. From the screenshots and a news release, it looks to be a port with boosted HD graphics, filters and standard fighting game modes such as a Challenge/Tutorial mode. In addition, this version will include GGPO-enabled online play and replays that can be uploaded to YouTube.

It’s a good way for those who may have seen Morrigan Aensland and company in other games to see what the series is all about. The game will cost $14.99 or 1200 Microsoft Points.

To say that the Call of Juarez: The Cartel was a disappointment would be an understatement. The developer, Techland, wanted to take the series in a new, modern direction. Instead, they may as well have driven the series off a cliff and set the crashed remains on fire.

But everyone deserves a second chance, especially the team that also made the fantasticDead Island. They have another try at the series and went back to its roots in the Wild West. I had a chance to check out Call of Juarez: Gunslinger at Ubisoft’s Digital Day recently. The first-person shooter is scheduled to be a digital-only release on the Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network and the PC.

Much has been said about Phil Fish, the lead designer of Fez. He caused a small uproar at the Game Developers Conference in March with his contention that Japanese games are terrible (to put it mildly). There’s nothing wrong with opinionated developers, but if one is going to make a statement like that in front of someone who happens to be a Japanese developer, it’s best to be polite and phrase it better.

The comment irked some fans so much that they decided to boycott Fish’s game. And that’s a shame. It speaks for a need to separate artists from their creations. The visionaries who come up with masterpieces aren’t saints. They have their flaws and human weaknesses. Celebrated writer Yukio Mishima killed himself via seppuku after a failed coup attempt in Japan in 1970. Filmmaker Elia Kazan named names to the House Un-American Activities Committee. But those acts and political stances shouldn’t detract from the masterpieces they made. In the long run, it’s the work that speaks for itself rather than the artist. And the same should be said for Fish and Fez.

In an era where everyone is building fancy controls to make video games accessible to the mainstream. Sometimes a simpler solution gets overlooked. Instead of building 3D cameras or motion-sensing controls, it’s better and more sensible to invent gameplay that follows the old arcade adage — easy to learn but difficult to master.

Of course, those million-dollar ideas are hard to come by. They don’t grow on trees otherwise everyone would have blockbuster games. It takes time to develop. With Dancing Dots, it took two and a half years to experiment, refine and polish their ideas and the result is Rotastic, its upcoming downloadable title coming Sept. 21 on Xbox Live Arcade. (It’ll arrive on PlayStation Network in January. The developer has to port it over.)

When it comes to the premise, it goes like this: You’re a character with a grappling hook and you have to attach it to these pegs scattered throughout the level. Latching onto the peg, spins your character in a circle almost like a stone in a sling. Players have to use that momentum and fling themselves around each stage, collecting gems, avoiding traps and dueling enemies.

Criterion Games threw fans a curve ball with the unveiling of Burnout Crash. Instead of photorealistic graphics and accurate physics, this downloadable edition of the series is more cartoonish, built more for the casual fans. It’s a different take on the franchise that somehow manages to keep that Burnout feel.

But that was the single-player campaign. Given the casual nature of the release (It’s easy to pick up and play.), Burnout Crash lends itself to multiplayer and I had a chance to check out several aspects of it last week.

Ken Schachter used to work for Gameloft Canada. I know that doesn’t sound terribly exciting. The mobile games company makes solid titles, but they’re usually aping more established console franchises. Modern Combatis reminiscent of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare meanwhileNOVA could be mistaken for a Haloclone.

I’m not saying they’re bad, but they’re just not original. But as I said before, Schachter used to work there, and that means he’s moved on. More specifically, he’s started a small studio called trapdoor. It’s a team of 15 people, and their first project is a game called Warp.

You have to envy the kids growing up these days and you also have to hate their guts. They are living in a great era for childhood amusement, and looking back on what we — the youths of the 1980s — had, there’s no question who has the better toys.

Back in the day, I used to play with G.I. Joes and built forts and caves out of couch cushions. Kids now have video games, and instead of pushing their plastic tanks across dirt, they can maneuver virtual vehicles on a virtual battlefield. They can fire on enemy soldiers and shoot down planes.

I realized how good kids have it when I played through Signal Studios latest gameToy Soldiers: Cold War. It’s s a sequel to last year’s title set during World War I. But instead of playing as British and German figurines, the team updated the look and time period to more modern times.

Those craving a DeathSpank sequel for the past year will finally be sated. Hothead Games is bringing a proper follow-up to the series with The Baconing. (It’s a weird but delicious-sounding name, one that fans came up with.) Despite not being named in the title, DeathSpank, the comedic doer of justice, is still the star. He still slays foes with swords and clubs. He fire arrows as expected. And yes, the outhouse save points are still there.

The big difference in the upcoming sequel is that the fantasy elements are gone. This time around, The Baconing infused with more of a sci-fi theme. It seems that Hothead Games, which is self-publishing this title, is using their creative freedom and letting it run wild. The game is basically made by nerd for nerds and includes references to Tron, the Jetsons, the Infinity Gauntlet and other science fiction staples.

The Baconing itself begins after DeathSpank: Thongs of Virtue with the titular character bored out of his mind. He’s basically saved the world and has nothing else to prove. He putters around his castle unsure of what to do with himself, so just for kicks, DeathSpank decides to don all six thongs of virtue at the same time.

Burnout Crash! isn’t a driving game. It may have cars. It may have roads. But at its core, Criterion’s first DLC project is a pinball game in the guise of unmitigated vehicular destruction. It’s also a title that’s been a long time coming.

It originally began on the Wii and the driving force behind the idea was that players could draw their own tracks, but Criterion said it wasn’t as fun as they expected. The studio discovered that the real fun came from the impact in intersections. They went from a game that was all about user-generated content and turned it into one that was more level-based and inspired by old-school pinball.